Tag Archives: Drugawareness

All above were found dead in the small Utah community of Spanish Fork along with Kelly’s mother, 55-year-old Marie King. It appeared that all died of gunshot wounds.

Joshua had spent 7 years with the UT County Sheriff’s department before he began working for the Lindon Police Department. There has been no report of a suicide note, but there are reports of problems with the marriage a couple of months ago along with a brief separation.

Clues in this case are many mainly because it was in Utah, which has long been one of the highest users of antidepressants in the nation, A new mandatory program for addressing mental health and on job stressors has just recently been put into place in Joshua’s department. And anyone in Utah knows the first line of treatment for relationship issues or stressors of any type or just about anything that ails you is an antidepressant.

The following is what I just posted in local media on the case and in answer to someone who had just brought up soldiers not asking for help because they are afraid their rights to firearms will be taken from them:

“How right you are and how right they are about their rights to own firearms! I put a blog out on that very issue last week. But in refusing treatment (which is generally antidepressants) they do not remain unhelped because antidepressants do not help with anxiety disorders. Instead they cause them according to research indicating that anxiety, depression, psychosis and suicide are all related to elevated serotonin levels rather than low serotonin levels.

“That has been known since the mid 50’s. In 2000 Dr. Murray Esler in Australia did research on those suffering anxiety disorders and found that they had serotonin levels eight times higher than normal! He then began asking as I have for over two decades why antidepressants are being prescribed for anxiety disorders which will further elevate their serotonin. In fact the latest research shows that antidepressants cause long term depression and it is my opinion after over two decades working with these patients that they also suffer long-term anxiety and Dr. Esler’s research would explain why that is so.

“Since the FDA warned in 2006 that anyone under the age of 25 has double the chance of suicide when they take antidepressants, which is generally the age of our military, why are we not realizing this is where the high rate of suicide is coming from among the troops? Did we all fail math?!

“Cases of murder/suicide as we have seen this week in UT were basically unheard of before these SSRI antidepressants. We have built a database of thousands of cases that can be found on our website if you Google “drugawareness” and “ssristories.” In both of the murder/suicides this week there was indication of possible prescriptions for these drugs….

“In Kyler’s case she had just lost her grandfather who she said was her whole “heart and soul”. This happened in mid Oct.

“In Joshua’s case he and his wife had had some marital difficulties in the past few months and the department had started a program to look for possible mental issues to insure they were treated. It takes so little to be prescribed an antidepressant – especially in Utah! Someone needs to ask in both of these tragedies. They are coming in at such a high rate that I cannot even begin to keep up now after tracking them for over two decades! The public has got to wake up from this serotonin nightmare!”

Ann Blake Tracy, Executive Director,
International Coalition for Drug Awarenesswww.drugawareness.org&http://ssristories.drugawareness.orgAuthor: ”Prozac: Panacea or Pandora? – Our Serotonin Nightmare – The Complete Truth of the Full Impact of Antidepressants Upon Us & Our World” & Withdrawal CD “Help! I Can’t Get Off My Antidepressant!”

WITHDRAWAL WARNING: In sharing this information about adverse reactions to antidepressants I always recommend that you also give reference to my CD on safe withdrawal, Help! I Can’t Get Off My Antidepressant!, so that we do not have more people dropping off these drugs too quickly – a move which I have warned from the beginning can be even more dangerous than staying on the drugs!

The FDA also now warns that any abrupt change in dose of an antidepressant can produce suicide, hostility or psychosis. These reactions can either come on very rapidly or even be delayed for months depending upon the adverse effects upon sleep patterns when the withdrawal is rapid! You can find the hour and a half long CD on safe and effective withdrawal helps here: http://store.drugawareness.org/

I want to make all of you familiar with those on our Board of Directors and our State and various Country directors around the world who work with us here at the International Coalition for Drug Awareness (ICFDA). This is something I should have been doing long before this rather than letting you search it out on your own. You will soon find introductory videos of each of our Board Members and area directors on our website at www.drugawareness.org with a direct link at www.drugawareness.org/mission/board/.

The following video is a GREAT introduction for my dear friend of many years now, Dr. Lorraine Day who has long served on our Board of Directors.

Our main connection was our personal battles with cancer. Although we did not know one another at the time we were struggling, we both got rid of our cancers the same way. The only difference was that I did use some of the old Indian herbs as well as going on a slightly stricter diet of ONLY fruit, nuts, and veggies for seven years. In no time I never felt better nor had so much energy!

She lives what she preaches! You will never find Lorraine in her home or anywhere else it seems, without a glass of water in her hand. She is a firm believer in hydration and lives those beliefs. And her healthy living definitely pays off! When I first met her and before we were introduced, I was sure the person in front of me was her daughter and that she would be taking me to her mother. I knew how old Lorraine was at the time, but the woman in front of me had to be at least 20 years younger than that! For additional information on Dr. Day, her own personal website is www.drday.com. If you know anyone with cancer be sure to share this video with them as this is one of Dr. Day’s main issues she deals with.

I have often told my daughter that I need to hang a picture of Dr. Day in my home as a constant reminder to me of all the laws of health she reminds us about in this video. Thank you Lorraine for all you do for so many and thank you for your support in this cause of the terrible mass drugging of humanity with so many deadly antidepressants and other deadly prescription drugs!

Accutane, with Black Box Warning for suicide, is still worth trying???

According to an article in the Daily Mail written by a doctor the drug given for acne “Acutance is still worth trying” … a deadly drug with a Black Box Warning for suicide!

My opinion? I am absolutely appalled that the Daily Mail would stoop so low as to print such rubbish! Talk about a drug infomercial! Anyone with a functioning brain who can read research knows full well how Accutane produces depression and suicide – it produces drastic drops in blood sugar long known to be involved not only in depression, but many psychiatric symptoms.

Accutane is an extremely dangerous drug known to produce suicide, birth defects and many other serious reactions and what is worse is there is absolutely no need for it. All anyone with acne needs to do is use simple natural products that are safe. One of the best would be ionic silver, one of the best antibiotics ever known to man. Why risk one’s life and health by using such a deadly and dangerous drug that carries a Black Box Warning for suicide?

WE ARE EXCITED TO LET YOU KNOW THAT WE ARE STARTING A DRUG AWARENESS MEMBERSHIP PROGRAM TO BETTER HELP TO SHARE INFORMATION & EDUCATE AS MANY AS POSSIBLE ABOUT THESE DRUGS…WHAT HAS GONE ON IN MEDICINE & IN COURTROOMS, & IN THE MEDIA SINCE THEY WERE FIRST INTRODUCED. WE HAVE PUT TOGETHER AN ENTIRE LIBRARY OF AUDIO & VIDEO TO TAKE YOU THROUGH THE HISTORY OF THE PAST 20+ YEARS SINCE THESE DRUGS WERE INTRODUCED. (YOU MAY SKIP BELOW TO OPPORTUNITY TO SEE WHAT WE HAVE PUT TOGETHER FOR YOU OR SEE OUR HISTORY DETAILED BELOW.)

HISTORY/BACKGROUND: Most of you know that since 1990 I have been researching serotonin & antidepressants & gathering information from the media & court cases on these drugs. You also know that I began gathering cases involving these drugs at the same time. At a local meeting in Salt Lake City of those concerned about Prozac people begged me to become the local director for the Prozac Survivor’s Support Group. I graciously declined explaining that I did not see how I could spend the time researching & writing my book about antidepressants & do that as well. My world turned upside down the following day when the 20 year old son of a local attorney jumped to his death outside my downtown office window. His dying words to the responding officers included the fact that he was on Prozac. That was the day I agreed to become the Utah director for the Prozac Survivor’s Support Group. In September of that year I testified before the first FDA hearing on Prozac & now am the only one who has attended every FDA hearing on SSRI antidepressants ever held.

When Rosie Meysenberg & I met in 1996 we joined forces in gathering & documenting these cases. We began with gathering a group of antidepressant cases of women who were committing very violent murders & murder/suicides – something that stood out in society as a rarity. Rosie & I continued this effort gathering cases of murder/suicide, parents killing children, children killing parents, school shootings, workplace violence, road rage, air rage, False Accusations of Sexual Abuse, soldiers committing suicide, murder & murder/suicides, female school teachers seducing male students, etc. A decade later Rosie & her husband Gene paid me a visit to gather and consolidate as many cases as possible gathered over the years to began putting together a searchable database of these cases to post on the internet. That database is now located at www.ssristories.drugawareness.org & has been the basis for two major medical research studies so far. Sadly Rosie left us a week ago to join those whose battle we have been fighting for two decades before getting a chance to see in action what she knew we were working on.

Then in 1997 Mark Miller, who had recently lost his 13 year old only son, Matt, to a Zoloft-induced suicide, after only one week on the drug, joined Rosie & I to put up our website at www.drugawareness.org . He did a marvelously impressive job taking Drug Awareness quickly to the top of the charts on the net as so many families searched for answers as to what had happened in their families! This was the humble beginnings of the International Coalition for Drug Awareness. Over the years many have joined us in this battle for truth about antidepressants & their impact upon our society.

Also over the years everyone seemed to expect me to gather the media coverage in the newspapers, magazines & television. It seemed that I quickly became the antidepressant library for the planet documenting the peddling of these drugs to our world. That is what we are opening up now to make available to everyone. Since 1991 I have been doing radio & television shows & newspaper & magazine articles/interviews on the SSRI antidepressants. I have lost track of just how many, but they are all safely tucked away to document this antidepressant age & stand as a witness of all that has happened as a result. We are pulling them all out, dusting off the cobwebs & making them available to our members. More & more will be added each & every month.

DRUG AWARENESS MEMORIAL: We also want you to be aware of the memorial area we made available a few years ago. This is for you to place videos or just pictures of your loved one lost to these deadly antidepressant drugs. If you have not yet put together a video collage of your loved one we do have professionals who will do so for you at a discount so that you too may post your own video. I encourage you to go to the memorial area of our website to see how to go about this. Please allow people to see how much our world has lost with the loss of your loved one – their talents & contributions they would have offered to our world that we will now never see because of these drugs. You understand & feel that loss more than anyone because you were blessed to know them so well. Make the world see what you saw in them so that they can understand too what all was lost when we lost them! I refuse to allow them to remain numbers! I want to world to see them for who they were. Memorial
OPPORTUNITY: We are going to offer three membership packages with perks for access to this information & additional educational opportunities. Of course as a member your dues support the many causes and projects of Drug Awareness:

Membership Package #1 SILVER: You receive instant online access to 17 audio/radio shows by Ann Blake-Tracy (Well over $100 worth of audios with many more to come soon!), instant access to the 1/2 hour long withdrawal CD by Ann Blake-Tracy PLUS FOR THE FIRST 100 WHO SIGN UP THEY WILL RECEIVE: a MP3 download of the CD to share with others PLUS another download of Ann Blake-Tracy’s most favorite of lectures over the past 20 years: a dynamic delivery of information presented to a group of 2000 gathered for a Young Living Oils Convention. Ann Blake-Tracy received a standing ovation for this lecture.

Membership Package #2 GOLD: You receive instant online access to 17 audio/radio shows by Ann Blake-Tracy (Well over $100 worth of audios with many more to come soon!), instant access to the 1/2 hour long withdrawal CD by Ann Blake-Tracy plus an MP3 download of the CD to share with others AND another download of Ann Blake-Tracy’s most favorite of lectures over the past 20 years: a dynamic delivery of information presented to a group of 2000 gathered for a Young Living Oils Convention. Ann Blake-Tracy received a standing ovation for this lecture. PLUS YOU GET instant access to all DVDs & videos offered through our Drug Awareness Book Store (Well over $100 retail value of audio & over $100 retail value of DVDs!) PLUS FOR THE FIRST 100 WHO SIGN UP THEY WILL RECEIVE FOR THE FIRST THREE MONTHS: a 1/2 hour free either personal withdrawal or legal consultation with Ann Blake-Tracy (a $62.50 – $125 value!! for the first three months of membership then changing to a 1/2 hour long monthly conference call with Ann Blake-Tracy)

Membership Package #3 PLATINUM: You receive instant online access to 17 audio/radio shows by Ann Blake-Tracy (Well over $100 worth of audios with many more to come soon!), instant access to the 1/2 hour long withdrawal CD by Ann Blake-Tracy plus an MP3 download of the CD to share with others AND another download of Ann Blake-Tracy’s most favorite of lectures over the past 20 years: a dynamic delivery of information presented to a group of 2000 gathered for a Young Living Oils Convention. Ann Blake-Tracy received a standing ovation for this lecture. PLUS YOU GET instant access to all DVDs & videos offered through our Drug Awareness Book Store (Well over $100 retail value of audio & over $100 retail value of DVDs!) PLUS FOR THE FIRST 100 WHO SIGN UP THEY WILL RECEIVE FOR THE FIRST THREE MONTHS: a 1 hour free – either personal withdrawal or legal – consultation with Ann Blake-Tracy (a $125 – $250 value!! for the first three months of membership then changing to an hour long monthly conference call with Ann Blake-Tracy)

There will be many perks & free CDs & DVDs to share with others as we go along. Education is the only way to stop this nightmare! Without understanding too many are lured right back into the web of deceit woven by the drug makers about these deadly drugs!

Messages In This Digest (1 Message)

We have lost one of our most valient warriors Rosie Meysenberg

Posted by: “Ann Blake-Tracy”

I certainly did not expect to be needing to contact you so soon, but it is with deepest regret this evening that I come to inform you that early this morning we lost one of the most valiant warriors in this battle for truth about the dangers of antidepressants. My dear friend & “right hand man” for 15 plus years & our Texas Director for ICFDA, Rosie Meysenberg, left this earth to join those whose battle we have been fighting for so long. If I know Rosie she will rally those there to join with us here to intensify our efforts to end this worldwide antidepressant holocaust as she & I so often called it.Together we worked these many years to gather as many cases as possible to form the database located at www.ssristories.drugawareness.org. I told her I wanted as many cases documented as possible because I never wanted even one death to go unnoticed. So while I contacted families & reporters & law enforcement personnel to educate them & ask them if these drugs were involved in each tragedy, Rosie & her husband Gene combined their skills to put together this marvelous searchable database of cases so that others could see the end result for these people after using antidepressants.

The news of Rosie’s passing that came this morning & tells you where you can go to leave your condolences is below:

A new journal entry titled Rosie was posted on Rosie’s CaringBridge website at 8:27 AM, CST on March 8, 2012.

Please leave your condolences as I know it would be a great comfort to Rosie’s family to see the impact of her sacrifices upon each of your lives. My comment & final goodby is below:

“I knew I did not want to open the notice this morning that gave me the news from Gene that you had left us! Somehow for the past day or so I knew this news was coming.

“Am I selfish in wanting to keep you here? YES! I don’t know what I am going to do without you!

“But now you are there with all those whose battle we have fought together for the past two decades. Fill them in, as I know you will, on all we have worked to do in their behalf to insure their deaths were not in vain … that we have worked hard to make sure their experiences with these deadly antidepressants are serving as a lesson to others & saving lives. Please assure them for me that I will find a way to carry on without you although I don’t know how at this point. I do know how difficult it will be to go on without you as closely as we have worked all these years. Few others understand fully all the adverse effects of antidepressants the way you did making it so much easier to share with you about all of these cases. Now who do I call to share with?

“But I know that you know me well enough to know I will carry this work on & continue to document these tragedies as you & I did together for so many years. I know that is what you would want because you would do the same for me if it were me who had gone before you! You just watch from there when you get a chance Rosie. I will make sure you are a part of it too just like when you could not make it back for the second FDA hearing when they put the Black Box warning on antidepressants for suicide. Remember how excited you were that I called you on my cell & put you on speaker so that you could be in that room with me to hear that monumentous FDA decision? Don’t worry Rosie … I will find a way again to make sure you do not miss out on hearing the final win in this battle for truth we have fought together. We will get special permission from Our Father in Heaven for you to check in occasionally & you will see that WE WILL WIN! Our work will not be in vain! It WILL succeed in opening the eyes of the world & it WILL continue to save many lives. I promise you that! And through this the world will see what a blessing you were to all of mankind . . . I love you Rosie & will always miss you!

“May your wonderful family be blessed at this time with peace & comfort knowing full well how honorably you fulfilled your mission in life & how much they all meant to you. May the legacy you left for them always be a perfect example to them of how to conduct their own lives.

“Bye for now Rosie . . .”

SSRI Storieshttp://ssristories.drugawareness.org/
Withdrawal can often be more dangerous than continuing on a medication. It is important to withdraw extremely slowly from these drugs, usually over a period of a year or more, under the supervision of a qualified specialist. Withdrawal is sometimes more severe than the original …

A doctor who is telling the truth about the hypomanic episode this
judge experienced from his antidepressant?!!!!! How refreshing that
the patient is getting the truth rather than being told he had an
“underlying” Bipolar Disorder that was manifest by his antidepressant
use!!!!! Why can’t other doctors be as honest and come right out and
tell the patient that their Bipolar symptoms have been brought on by
their antidepressant?

BUT when a patient experiences mania or hypomania from an
antidepressant, it is ABSOLUTELY INSANE to think they will not
experience it again on a different antidepressant! He and his family
had better hold their breaths!

What a shame when this happened that he did not have a copy of my DVD,
“Bipolar, Shmypolar! Are You Really Bipolar or Misdiagnosed Due to the
Use of or Abrupt Discontinuation of an Antidepressant?” If he had, the
DVD would have served as a warning for him about this common reaction
to both antidepressant use and abrupt withdrawal from antidepressants.

Why are these “Bipolar” patients not told they are suffering
continuous mild seizure activity which is what Bipolar Disorder is – a
sleep/seizure disorder brought on by the drugs?! ANTI-depressants are
stimulants, stimulants over stimulate the brain producing seizures.
The one time of day we all are in seizure activity is during REM sleep
– the dream state. So antidepressants are basically chemically
inducing the dream state during wakefulness.

By the way, the names “Mania” and “Hypomania” should be changed to
“Shear Hell on Earth!!!!!!!”

Ann Blake-Tracy, Executive Director
International Coalition for Drug Awarenesswww.drugawareness.org & www.ssristories.drugawareness.org
Author: Prozac: Panacea or Pandora? – Our Serotonin
Nightmare – The Complete Truth of the Full Impact of
Antidepressants Upon Us & Our World & Help! I
Can’t Get Off My Antidepressant!

First, there was his heart stent surgery in the spring of 2009.

Following surgery, he found himself feeling depressed, a scenario
experienced by some heart patients, he later learned. The depression
was compounded by the death of a good friend, he said.

Next, came a period of his taking an antidepressant, Lexapro, that he
found helpful. But, he said, he stopped the medicine, on his own, too
quickly.

What happened next, he said, was later diagnosed as an episode of
hypomania, an expression of bipolar disorder. . .

Blanche [Downing’s physician], though, describes the episode as a case
of antidepressant-induced hypomania, attributing it to a second
antidepressant that Downing was later prescribed by another physician.

“Medications can commonly cause hypomania, and it’s not really
understood why,” said Dr. Mark Townsend, a professor of psychiatry at
the LSU Health Sciences Center in New Orleans.

Antidepressants can bring on hypomania, as can steroids, he said.

“There’s really not a diagnostic category for antidepressant-induced
hypomania” in the current Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental
Disorders, Blanche said, but he predicted there will be one in the
manual’s next edition.

Bob Downing, former 1st Circuit Court of Appeal judge, whose sudden
resignation from the bench last summer was surrounded by confusion,
can sort out the events on a kind of timeline.

First, there was his heart stent surgery in the spring of 2009.

Following surgery, he found himself feeling depressed, a scenario
experienced by some heart patients, he later learned. The depression
was compounded by the death of a good friend, he said.

Next, came a period of his taking an antidepressant, Lexapro, that he
found helpful. But, he said, he stopped the medicine, on his own, too
quickly.

What happened next, he said, was later diagnosed as an episode of
hypomania, an expression of bipolar disorder.

During the episode that lasted approximately three months, Downing
spent money wildly, alienated family, friends and employees and
resigned from the judicial bench, about the time he was hospitalized
and treated.

“It was a short period. It seemed like an eternity,” Downing, 61, said
recently from an office at the law firm of Dué, Price, Guidry,
Piedrahita and Andrews, where he’s working in an “of counsel” status.

In that capacity, Downing said that attorneys with the firm will work
with him on cases he brings in, but he is not on salary at the firm.
Downing handles personal injury cases.

Now being treated with medication for what was likely a one-time event
and back to feeling like himself, Downing said he recently decided to
speak out about his experience for several reasons.

“For people who have open heart surgery or stents, watch out for
depression,” Downing said.

One in five people experience an episode of depression after having
heart surgery, according to the website,http://www.psychcentral.com,
an independent mental health and psychology network run by mental
health professionals.

Downing also advises people taking antidepressants to stay in touch
with their doctor.

And, he said, “If you start feeling really wonderful and start
spending a lot of money, you need to see a counselor,” Downing said.

Hypomania is “a condition similar to mania but less severe,” according
to MedicineNet.com, a physician-produced online health-care publishing
company.

“The symptoms are similar, with elevated mood, increased activity,
decreased need for sleep, grandiosity, racing thoughts and the like,”
the company reports at its medical dictionary
website,http://www.medterms.com.

“It is important to diagnose hypomania, because, as an expression of
bipolar disorder, it can cycle into depression and carry an increased
risk of suicide,” the site reports.

Bipolar disorder is marked by periods of elevated or irritable mood —
the mania — alternating with depression, according to the National
Institutes of Health.

The mood swings between mania and depression can be very abrupt, it reports.

“Whether it’s hypomania or mania is a matter of severity,” said local
psychiatrist Dr. Robert Blanche, who is Downing’s physician.

“In general, it’s an elevated or an irritable mood that’s not normal
for the person,” Blanche said.

“In his (Downing’s) case, he was irritable and also, maybe the word is
‘expansive’ in his affects, (showing) euphoria, elation and
excitement,” Blanche said.

“He had never had a history of this before,” Blanche said.

Downing theorizes that his stopping his antidepressant too quickly, on
his own, led to the episode.

Blanche, though, describes the episode as a case of
antidepressant-induced hypomania, attributing it to a second
antidepressant that Downing was later prescribed by another physician.

“Medications can commonly cause hypomania, and it’s not really
understood why,” said Dr. Mark Townsend, a professor of psychiatry at
the LSU Health Sciences Center in New Orleans.

Antidepressants can bring on hypomania, as can steroids, he said.

“There’s really not a diagnostic category for antidepressant-induced
hypomania” in the current Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental
Disorders, Blanche said, but he predicted there will be one in the
manual’s next edition.

Blanche said the only way to arrest the condition of hypomania is for
the person to go into the hospital so that their medications can be
adjusted.

During his own hospitalization, Downing was prescribed a mood
stabilizer, Depakote, classified as an anti-seizure medicine and the
medicine most commonly prescribed for mania by psychiatrists, Blanche
said.

The medicine acts to bind up what can be described as “excitatory”
chemicals in the brain, Blanche said.

Ultimately, though, that can result in a depletion of those chemicals
and a person can slide into a depression, Blanche said.

“If (a patient) is on a mood stabilizer, you can introduce an
antidepressant,” he said.

Downing said that his current antidepressant, Wellbutrin, is working
well for him.

After living through a hypomanic episode, some patients choose to stay
on the medicine, Blanche said.

“Some people will actually choose to stay on the medicine, just
because they don’t want it to ever happen again,” he said.

Fortunately, the condition “is one of the most treatable conditions in
psychiatry,” added Blanche, who serves as the psychiatrist at the East
Baton Rouge Parish jail and is the medical director of an emergency
psychiatric treatment center affiliated with the Earl K. Long Medical
Center.

Downing’s experiences this summer seem to have had all the markings of
manic episodes of bipolar disorder.

“Around the first of June 2010, I started feeling really good, started
talking a lot more, making big plans,” Downing said.

Around that time, he went to speak at a law conference in Carmel, Calif.

“I went to Yosemite, it was beautiful. I would wake up at 3 o’clock, 4
o’clock, 5 o’clock (thinking) ‘You need to retire, buy some foreclosed
properties, fix them up and make money to help people in India dig
wells,” Downing said.

“I was making grandiose plans,” he said.

Usually frugal, he started spending money, too, he said.

Before the episode was over, he had run up debts of almost $100,000,
buying such things as a 1971 Rolls Royce, three Harley-Davidson
motorcycles and a 1952 police car, he said.

He also bought a $1,000 commercial pressure washer, a large lawn
tractor and expensive new tools to help put a formerly homeless man
into business, he said.

“He just wasn’t himself,” said his wife, Pam Downing.

The couple will have been married 30 years on March 29.

“When the person is in that condition, you really can’t reason with
them,” Blanche said.

“The amazing thing about it is that it robs the person of their
insight,” he said.

In contrast, people are “painfully aware” of the other aspect of
bipolar disorder — depression, Blanche said.

Physicians and employers may miss a condition like hypomania, said
Townsend, because, like most people, “we like happy people, perky
people.”

“There’s a little more-rapid thinking, (rapid) speech, a decreased
need for sleep” in someone with mania, he said.

“When it becomes a condition is when it affects functioning,” Townsend said.

“It’s wonderful that the judge is willing to be an advocate for
bipolar disorder” awareness, Townsend said, referring to Downing.

“It’s very common, and people with it can be very productive members
of our society. It’s all around us,” he said.

Downing’s symptoms brought along misunderstandings among friends and
family members and conflicting ideas on the cause and solution of the
situation, he and family members said
Downing said he refused to seek treatment.

Finally, at one point, his eldest daughter, Kathryne Hart, 27, after
consulting with a physician, sought to have her father committed to a
hospital. Hart’s efforts came after Downing threatened suicide if
there was any more talk about his going to see a doctor.

“She was very brave,” Downing said.

But Downing wasn’t at home as expected when sheriff’s deputies arrived
to bring him to the hospital.

Pam Downing, who supported Hart in the decision, had taken the
couple’s son, Wes Downing, then 24, to visit a relative in Missouri
and to get away from the stressful situation at that time. The
Downings also have another daughter, Kiera Downing, 26.

Shortly afterward, a group of Downing’s friends brought Downing to see
Blanche, who then admitted Downing into a psychiatric hospital, and
Downing began the recovery process, Kathryne Hart said.

Hart said that the threat of her father taking his life was something
she couldn’t ignore.

When she was in middle school, she said, two fellow students killed
themselves within a week of each other.

“I couldn’t take that chance,” she said. “I was going to do anything
to save him.”

The family said it took about a month after his hospitalization for
Downing to begin seeming like himself again and to understand what had
happened.

Downing said he has struggled with guilt over the debt he accrued
during the manic episode.

He’s taken heart, he said, from something he read in the book “Words
to Lift Your Spirit” by Dale Brown:

“When we do experience failure in our jobs or in our personal lives,
we must not shackle ourselves with guilt, because it can lead to the
silent suffocation of our spirit.”

Downing said that his speaking about his experience is a way to bring
something positive from it.

“Something like this either tears a family apart or makes it
stronger,” Pam Downing said.

For them, the experience has made the family stronger, she said,
adding that they received a lot of support from the pastors of their
church, First Presbyterian.

Downing, who receives a pension for his years of public service,
served as a district judge for 15 years and as a 1st Circuit Court of
Appeal judge for 10 years.

Over the years, he also worked in various volunteer programs for
prison inmates, such as a Bible study and a program that prepared
inmates for getting jobs when they were released.

He also previously served on the boards of Cenikor, a treatment
community to help people end substance abuse, and the Baton Rouge
Marine Institute, now AMIkids Baton Rouge.

Looking back on the events of last summer, he said, “Twenty-five years
in public service and, then, at the end of my career, people are
going, ‘What’s happening? Something’s wrong.’”

Looking ahead to the future, Downing said, “I’ve been a positive
person most of my life. I can see light at the end of the tunnel.”

Bipolar disorder, classified as a mood disorder, affects about 5.7
million Americans or approximately 2.6 percent of the U.S. population.

The disorder, which affects men and women equally, involves periods of
mania — elevated or irritable mood — alternating with periods of
depression. There are two types. Bipolar disorder type I involves
periods of major depression and was formerly called manic depression.
Bipolar disorder type II involves hypomania, with symptoms that aren’t
as extreme as the symptoms of mania.

In most people with bipolar disorder, there is no clear cause.

The following, though, may trigger a manic episode in people
vulnerable to the illness:

Life changes such as childbirth.
Medication such as antidepressants and steroids.
Periods of sleeplessness.
Recreational drug use.

Medicines called mood stabilizers are the first line of treatment.
Antidepressant medications can be added to mood-stabilizing drugs.
Other medications used to treat bipolar disorder are anti-psychotic
drugs and anti-anxiety drugs.

A doctor who is telling the truth about the hypomanic episode this
judge experienced from his antidepressant?!!!!! How refreshing that
the patient is getting the truth rather than being told he had an
“underlying” Bipolar Disorder that was manifest by his antidepressant
use!!!!! Why can’t other doctors be as honest and come right out and
tell the patient that their Bipolar symptoms have been brought on by
their antidepressant?

BUT when a patient experiences mania or hypomania from an
antidepressant, it is ABSOLUTELY INSANE to think they will not
experience it again on a different antidepressant! He and his family
had better hold their breaths!

What a shame when this happened that he did not have a copy of my DVD,
“Bipolar, Shmypolar! Are You Really Bipolar or Misdiagnosed Due to the
Use of or Abrupt Discontinuation of an Antidepressant?” If he had, the
DVD would have served as a warning for him about this common reaction
to both antidepressant use and abrupt withdrawal from antidepressants.

Why are these “Bipolar” patients not told they are suffering
continuous mild seizure activity which is what Bipolar Disorder is – a
sleep/seizure disorder brought on by the drugs?! ANTI-depressants are
stimulants, stimulants over stimulate the brain producing seizures.
The one time of day we all are in seizure activity is during REM sleep
– the dream state. So antidepressants are basically chemically
inducing the dream state during wakefulness.

By the way, the names “Mania” and “Hypomania” should be changed to
“Shear Hell on Earth!!!!!!!”

Ann Blake-Tracy, Executive Director
International Coalition for Drug Awareness
www.drugawareness.org & www.ssristories.drugawareness.org
Author: Prozac: Panacea or Pandora? – Our Serotonin
Nightmare – The Complete Truth of the Full Impact of
Antidepressants Upon Us & Our World & Help! I
Can’t Get Off My Antidepressant!

First, there was his heart stent surgery in the spring of 2009.

Following surgery, he found himself feeling depressed, a scenario
experienced by some heart patients, he later learned. The depression
was compounded by the death of a good friend, he said.

Next, came a period of his taking an antidepressant, Lexapro, that he
found helpful. But, he said, he stopped the medicine, on his own, too
quickly.

What happened next, he said, was later diagnosed as an episode of
hypomania, an expression of bipolar disorder. . .

Blanche [Downing’s physician], though, describes the episode as a case
of antidepressant-induced hypomania, attributing it to a second
antidepressant that Downing was later prescribed by another physician.

“Medications can commonly cause hypomania, and it’s not really
understood why,” said Dr. Mark Townsend, a professor of psychiatry at
the LSU Health Sciences Center in New Orleans.

Antidepressants can bring on hypomania, as can steroids, he said.

“There’s really not a diagnostic category for antidepressant-induced
hypomania” in the current Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental
Disorders, Blanche said, but he predicted there will be one in the
manual’s next edition.

Bob Downing, former 1st Circuit Court of Appeal judge, whose sudden
resignation from the bench last summer was surrounded by confusion,
can sort out the events on a kind of timeline.

First, there was his heart stent surgery in the spring of 2009.

Following surgery, he found himself feeling depressed, a scenario
experienced by some heart patients, he later learned. The depression
was compounded by the death of a good friend, he said.

Next, came a period of his taking an antidepressant, Lexapro, that he
found helpful. But, he said, he stopped the medicine, on his own, too
quickly.

What happened next, he said, was later diagnosed as an episode of
hypomania, an expression of bipolar disorder.

During the episode that lasted approximately three months, Downing
spent money wildly, alienated family, friends and employees and
resigned from the judicial bench, about the time he was hospitalized
and treated.

“It was a short period. It seemed like an eternity,” Downing, 61, said
recently from an office at the law firm of Dué, Price, Guidry,
Piedrahita and Andrews, where he’s working in an “of counsel” status.

In that capacity, Downing said that attorneys with the firm will work
with him on cases he brings in, but he is not on salary at the firm.
Downing handles personal injury cases.

Now being treated with medication for what was likely a one-time event
and back to feeling like himself, Downing said he recently decided to
speak out about his experience for several reasons.

“For people who have open heart surgery or stents, watch out for
depression,” Downing said.

One in five people experience an episode of depression after having
heart surgery, according to the website,http://www.psychcentral.com,
an independent mental health and psychology network run by mental
health professionals.

Downing also advises people taking antidepressants to stay in touch
with their doctor.

And, he said, “If you start feeling really wonderful and start
spending a lot of money, you need to see a counselor,” Downing said.

Hypomania is “a condition similar to mania but less severe,” according
to MedicineNet.com, a physician-produced online health-care publishing
company.

“The symptoms are similar, with elevated mood, increased activity,
decreased need for sleep, grandiosity, racing thoughts and the like,”
the company reports at its medical dictionary
website,http://www.medterms.com.

“It is important to diagnose hypomania, because, as an expression of
bipolar disorder, it can cycle into depression and carry an increased
risk of suicide,” the site reports.

Bipolar disorder is marked by periods of elevated or irritable mood —
the mania — alternating with depression, according to the National
Institutes of Health.

The mood swings between mania and depression can be very abrupt, it reports.

“Whether it’s hypomania or mania is a matter of severity,” said local
psychiatrist Dr. Robert Blanche, who is Downing’s physician.

“In general, it’s an elevated or an irritable mood that’s not normal
for the person,” Blanche said.

“In his (Downing’s) case, he was irritable and also, maybe the word is
‘expansive’ in his affects, (showing) euphoria, elation and
excitement,” Blanche said.

“He had never had a history of this before,” Blanche said.

Downing theorizes that his stopping his antidepressant too quickly, on
his own, led to the episode.

Blanche, though, describes the episode as a case of
antidepressant-induced hypomania, attributing it to a second
antidepressant that Downing was later prescribed by another physician.

“Medications can commonly cause hypomania, and it’s not really
understood why,” said Dr. Mark Townsend, a professor of psychiatry at
the LSU Health Sciences Center in New Orleans.

Antidepressants can bring on hypomania, as can steroids, he said.

“There’s really not a diagnostic category for antidepressant-induced
hypomania” in the current Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental
Disorders, Blanche said, but he predicted there will be one in the
manual’s next edition.

Blanche said the only way to arrest the condition of hypomania is for
the person to go into the hospital so that their medications can be
adjusted.

During his own hospitalization, Downing was prescribed a mood
stabilizer, Depakote, classified as an anti-seizure medicine and the
medicine most commonly prescribed for mania by psychiatrists, Blanche
said.

The medicine acts to bind up what can be described as “excitatory”
chemicals in the brain, Blanche said.

Ultimately, though, that can result in a depletion of those chemicals
and a person can slide into a depression, Blanche said.

“If (a patient) is on a mood stabilizer, you can introduce an
antidepressant,” he said.

Downing said that his current antidepressant, Wellbutrin, is working
well for him.

After living through a hypomanic episode, some patients choose to stay
on the medicine, Blanche said.

“Some people will actually choose to stay on the medicine, just
because they don’t want it to ever happen again,” he said.

Fortunately, the condition “is one of the most treatable conditions in
psychiatry,” added Blanche, who serves as the psychiatrist at the East
Baton Rouge Parish jail and is the medical director of an emergency
psychiatric treatment center affiliated with the Earl K. Long Medical
Center.

Downing’s experiences this summer seem to have had all the markings of
manic episodes of bipolar disorder.

“Around the first of June 2010, I started feeling really good, started
talking a lot more, making big plans,” Downing said.

Around that time, he went to speak at a law conference in Carmel, Calif.

“I went to Yosemite, it was beautiful. I would wake up at 3 o’clock, 4
o’clock, 5 o’clock (thinking) ‘You need to retire, buy some foreclosed
properties, fix them up and make money to help people in India dig
wells,” Downing said.

“I was making grandiose plans,” he said.

Usually frugal, he started spending money, too, he said.

Before the episode was over, he had run up debts of almost $100,000,
buying such things as a 1971 Rolls Royce, three Harley-Davidson
motorcycles and a 1952 police car, he said.

He also bought a $1,000 commercial pressure washer, a large lawn
tractor and expensive new tools to help put a formerly homeless man
into business, he said.

“He just wasn’t himself,” said his wife, Pam Downing.

The couple will have been married 30 years on March 29.

“When the person is in that condition, you really can’t reason with
them,” Blanche said.

“The amazing thing about it is that it robs the person of their
insight,” he said.

In contrast, people are “painfully aware” of the other aspect of
bipolar disorder — depression, Blanche said.

Physicians and employers may miss a condition like hypomania, said
Townsend, because, like most people, “we like happy people, perky
people.”

“There’s a little more-rapid thinking, (rapid) speech, a decreased
need for sleep” in someone with mania, he said.

“When it becomes a condition is when it affects functioning,” Townsend said.

“It’s wonderful that the judge is willing to be an advocate for
bipolar disorder” awareness, Townsend said, referring to Downing.

“It’s very common, and people with it can be very productive members
of our society. It’s all around us,” he said.

Downing’s symptoms brought along misunderstandings among friends and
family members and conflicting ideas on the cause and solution of the
situation, he and family members said
Downing said he refused to seek treatment.

Finally, at one point, his eldest daughter, Kathryne Hart, 27, after
consulting with a physician, sought to have her father committed to a
hospital. Hart’s efforts came after Downing threatened suicide if
there was any more talk about his going to see a doctor.

“She was very brave,” Downing said.

But Downing wasn’t at home as expected when sheriff’s deputies arrived
to bring him to the hospital.

Pam Downing, who supported Hart in the decision, had taken the
couple’s son, Wes Downing, then 24, to visit a relative in Missouri
and to get away from the stressful situation at that time. The
Downings also have another daughter, Kiera Downing, 26.

Shortly afterward, a group of Downing’s friends brought Downing to see
Blanche, who then admitted Downing into a psychiatric hospital, and
Downing began the recovery process, Kathryne Hart said.

Hart said that the threat of her father taking his life was something
she couldn’t ignore.

When she was in middle school, she said, two fellow students killed
themselves within a week of each other.

“I couldn’t take that chance,” she said. “I was going to do anything
to save him.”

The family said it took about a month after his hospitalization for
Downing to begin seeming like himself again and to understand what had
happened.

Downing said he has struggled with guilt over the debt he accrued
during the manic episode.

He’s taken heart, he said, from something he read in the book “Words
to Lift Your Spirit” by Dale Brown:

“When we do experience failure in our jobs or in our personal lives,
we must not shackle ourselves with guilt, because it can lead to the
silent suffocation of our spirit.”

Downing said that his speaking about his experience is a way to bring
something positive from it.

“Something like this either tears a family apart or makes it
stronger,” Pam Downing said.

For them, the experience has made the family stronger, she said,
adding that they received a lot of support from the pastors of their
church, First Presbyterian.

Downing, who receives a pension for his years of public service,
served as a district judge for 15 years and as a 1st Circuit Court of
Appeal judge for 10 years.

Over the years, he also worked in various volunteer programs for
prison inmates, such as a Bible study and a program that prepared
inmates for getting jobs when they were released.

He also previously served on the boards of Cenikor, a treatment
community to help people end substance abuse, and the Baton Rouge
Marine Institute, now AMIkids Baton Rouge.

Looking back on the events of last summer, he said, “Twenty-five years
in public service and, then, at the end of my career, people are
going, ‘What’s happening? Something’s wrong.’”

Looking ahead to the future, Downing said, “I’ve been a positive
person most of my life. I can see light at the end of the tunnel.”

Bipolar disorder, classified as a mood disorder, affects about 5.7
million Americans or approximately 2.6 percent of the U.S. population.

The disorder, which affects men and women equally, involves periods of
mania — elevated or irritable mood — alternating with periods of
depression. There are two types. Bipolar disorder type I involves
periods of major depression and was formerly called manic depression.
Bipolar disorder type II involves hypomania, with symptoms that aren’t
as extreme as the symptoms of mania.

In most people with bipolar disorder, there is no clear cause.

The following, though, may trigger a manic episode in people
vulnerable to the illness:

Life changes such as childbirth.
Medication such as antidepressants and steroids.
Periods of sleeplessness.
Recreational drug use.

Medicines called mood stabilizers are the first line of treatment.
Antidepressant medications can be added to mood-stabilizing drugs.
Other medications used to treat bipolar disorder are anti-psychotic
drugs and anti-anxiety drugs.

We read in the article below the following statements about long-term use of antidepressants producing long-term depression & withdrawal. Now all these researchers had to do to learn this sooner was read the research in my book when the first edition came out almost 20 years ago. Once again I repeat that the hypothesis behind antidepressants is INCORRECT/BACKWARDS!! And if the hypothesis is backwards the drugs are going to CAUSE what we are being told that they cure!
“. . . there are reasons to believe that antidepressant treatment itself may contribute to a chronic depressive syndrome. . .
In other words, prolonged exposure to antidepressants can induce neuroplastic changes that result in the genesis of antidepressant-induced dysphoric symptoms. The investigators propose the term ‘tardive dysphoria’ to describe such a phenomenon and describe diagnostic criteria for it. Tapering or discontinuing the antidepressant might reverse the dysphoric state. Antidepressant discontinuation may not provide immediate relief. In fact, it is likely that transient symptoms of withdrawal will occur in the initial 2-4 weeks following antidepressant discontinuation or tapering. However, after a prolonged period of antidepressant abstinence, one may see a gradual return to the patient’s baseline.”
Ann Blake-Tracy, Executive Director
International Coalition for Drug Awarenesswww.drugawareness.org & www.ssristories.drugawareness.orgAuthor: Prozac: Panacea or Pandora? – Our Serotonin
Nightmare – The Complete Truth of the Full Impact of
Antidepressants Upon Us & Our World & Help! I
Can’t Get Off My Antidepressant!

Treatment-resistantdepression (TRD) may be related to inadequate dosing of antidepressants or antidepressant tolerance. Alternatively, there are reasons to believe that antidepressant treatment itself may contribute to a chronic depressive syndrome. This study reports a case of antidepressant discontinuation in a TRD patient, a 67-year-old white man with onset of major depressive illness at the age of 45. He was homozygous for the short form of the serotonin transporter. He was treated off and on until the age of 59 and had been on an antidepressant continuously until the age of 67. Over the previous 2 years he had been depressed without any relief by medication or 2 electroconvulsive treatments. His medications at the time of evaluation included paroxetine 10 mg daily, venlafaxine 75 mg daily and clonazepam 3 mg daily. His 17-item Hamilton depression score was 22. Over the subsequent 6 months, he was started on bupropion and then tapered off all antidepressants, including the bupropion. His Hamilton depression score dropped to 18. The patient was not satisfied with his progress and sought another opinion to restart antidepressants. One year later, on duloxetine 60 mg daily, he continued to complain of unremitting depression.

A possible prodepressant effect of antidepressants has been previously proposed. Fava was the first to suggest that an antidepressant-related neurobiochemical mechanism of increasing vulnerability to depression might play a role in worsening the long-term outcome of the illness. Understanding of potential mechanisms of this phenomenon can be gleaned from observations regarding the short form of the serotonin transporter (5HTTR). Patients with the short form of the 5HTTR and prolonged antidepressant exposure, may be particularly vulnerable to antidepressant-related worsening. In other words, prolonged exposure to antidepressants can induce neuroplastic changes that result in the genesis of antidepressant-induced dysphoric symptoms. The investigators propose the term ‘tardive dysphoria’ to describe such a phenomenon and describe diagnostic criteria for it. Tapering or discontinuing the antidepressant might reverse the dysphoric state. Antidepressant discontinuation may not provide immediate relief. In fact, it is likely that transient symptoms of withdrawal will occur in the initial 2-4 weeks following antidepressant discontinuation or tapering. However, after a prolonged period of antidepressant abstinence, one may see a gradual return to the patient’s baseline.

For those of you who have read my book Prozac: Panacea or Pandora? – Our Serotonin Nightmare with the extensive information on the great importance of sleep this report will be no surprise at all. It is always nice to have a confirmation of the information though. I thought it quite interesting to note that these researchers found that a nap can dramatically boost and restore your brainpower, refresh the mind, improve one’s capacity to learn, and make you smarter while to the contrary staying up late to cram for a test can decrease ability to learn by almost 40%! The more hours we stay awake the more sluggish our minds become. This makes it easy to understand why antidepressants, which produce so much insomnia and other sleep disorders, prevent you from learning and produce so much memory loss! Ann Blake-Tracy, Executive Director, International Coalition for Drug Awareness www.drugawareness.org & www.ssristories.drugawareness.orgAuthor: Prozac: Panacea or Pandora? – Our Serotonin Nightmare – The Complete Truth of the Full Impact of Antidepressants Upon Us & Our World & Help! I Can’t Get Off My Antidepressant! http://psychcentral.com/news/2010/02/22/power-naps-boost-brainpower/11615.html Power Naps Boost Brainpower By RICK NAUERT PHD Senior News Editor Reviewed by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on February 22, 2010 New research suggests an hour’s nap can dramatically boost and restore your brainpower. Researchers from the University of California, Berkeley discovered a nap can not only refresh the mind, but make you smarter. Conversely, the more hours we spend awake, the more sluggish our minds become, according to the findings. The results support previous data from the same research team that pulling an all-nighter – a common practice at college during midterms and finals –- decreases the ability to cram in new facts by nearly 40 percent, due to a shutdown of brain regions during sleep deprivation. “Sleep not only rights the wrong of prolonged wakefulness but, at a neurocognitive level, it moves you beyond where you were before you took a nap,” said Matthew Walker, an assistant professor of psychology at UC Berkeley and the lead investigator of these studies. In the recent UC Berkeley sleep study, 39 healthy young adults were divided into two groups – nap and no-nap. At noon, all the participants were subjected to a rigorous learning task intended to tax the hippocampus, a region of the brain that helps store fact-based memories. Both groups performed at comparable levels. At 2 p.m., the nap group took a 90-minute siesta while the no-nap group stayed awake. Later that day, at 6 p.m., participants performed a new round of learning exercises. Those who remained awake throughout the day became worse at learning. In contrast, those who napped did markedly better and actually improved in their capacity to learn. These findings reinforce the researchers’ hypothesis that sleep is needed to clear the brain’s short-term memory storage and make room for new information, said Walker, who presented his findings at the annual meeting of the American Association of the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in San Diego, Calif. Since 2007, Walker and other sleep researchers have established that fact-based memories are temporarily stored in the hippocampus before being sent to the brain’s prefrontal cortex, which may have more storage space. “It’s as though the e-mail inbox in your hippocampus is full and, until you sleep and clear out those fact e-mails, you’re not going to receive any more mail. It’s just going to bounce until you sleep and move it into another folder,” Walker said. In the latest study, Walker and his team have broken new ground in discovering that this memory-refreshing process occurs when nappers are engaged in a specific stage of sleep. Electroencephalogram tests, which measure electrical activity in the brain, indicated that this refreshing of memory capacity is related to Stage 2 non-REM sleep, which takes place between deep sleep (non-REM) and the dream state known as Rapid Eye Movement (REM). Previously, the purpose of this stage was unclear, but the new results offer evidence as to why humans spend at least half their sleeping hours in Stage 2, non-REM, Walker said. “I can’t imagine Mother Nature would have us spend 50 percent of the night going from one sleep stage to another for no reason,” Walker said. “Sleep is sophisticated. It acts locally to give us what we need.” Walker and his team will go on to investigate whether the reduction of sleep experienced by people as they get older is related to the documented decrease in our ability to learn as we age. Finding that link may be helpful in understanding such neurodegenerative conditions as Alzheimer’s disease, Walker said. Source: University of California, Berkeley

Paragraphs six through nine read: “According to a statement of facts agreed upon by the Crown and defence, during the summer of 2008 Francoeur was mistakenly diagnosed with major depression and prescribed an anti-depressant drug known as Effexor. During the next few months, she underwent a radical change.”

“Francoeur actually has bipolar disorder rather than depression ­ and Effexor is known to escalate the ‘manic’ phase experienced by people with bipolarism, which is characterized by extreme feelings of elation, euphoria, racing thoughts, inability to sleep and difficulty appreciating consequences, court heard.”

“Although she had previously been a very light drinker, Francoeur started using alcohol excessively, Piche told court. She spent money in careless ways, went days without sleep and ate irregularly, losing significant amounts of weight. She talked excessively and tookuncharacteristic shortcuts in caring for her daughters, who were five and seven years old.”

“The changes concerned her family members, who sent a letter to Francoeur’s doctor about the situation.”
———————–

SSRIStories.com & Drugawareness.org note: There are now 15 cases on SSRI Stories of women school teachers molesting their minor male students. Bill O’Reilly of the TV talk show, “The Factor” said they are receiving one case report every week. SSRI Stories does not have the resources to investigate these reports in regard to antidepressant use.

SSRIStories.com & Drugawareness.org note: Another additional note: The Physicians Desk Reference states that antidepressants can cause a craving for alcohol and can cause alcohol abuse. (Check out the SSRIs & Alcohol article at www.drugawareness.org for additional information on alcohol cravings.) Also, the liver cannot metabolize the antidepressant and the alcohol simultaneously, thus leading to higher levels of both alcohol and the antidepressantin the human body. http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Teacher+found+criminally+responsible+with+teen+student/4227894/story.html
Effexor & Alcohol: Female teacher found not criminally responsible for sex with male teen student

By Lori Coolican, Postmedia News February 4, 2011

A Saskatchewan teacher has been found not criminally responsible for having sex with a 15-year-old former student.

Photograph by: Joe Raedle, Getty Images
SASKATOON ­ Family and supporters of a teacher from Shell Lake, Sask., sighed with relief in a Saskatoon courtroom Friday after a judge declared her not criminally responsible, due to mental illness, for a sexual relationship with a 15-year-old former student.

Michelle Francoeur was in an extreme “manic state” and lacked the capacity to make rational decisions when she agreed to have sex with the teen boy on several occasions between Sept. 1 and Nov. 20, 2008, Queen’s Bench Justice Duane Koch found.

“The criminal law does not want to punish people who were suffering a mental disorder at the time of the act,” Crown prosecutor Mitch Piche said outside court.

Francoeur was charged with sexual touching, sexual exploitation and sexual assault against the teen, whose identity is protected by a publication ban, after RCMP received a complaint in December 2008.

She was suspended from her job at the Shell Lake school while the case was before the court.

According to a statement of facts agreed upon by the Crown and defence, during the summer of 2008 Francoeur was mistakenly diagnosed with major depression and prescribed an anti-depressant drug known as Effexor. During the next few months, she underwent a radical change.

Francoeur actually has bipolar disorder rather than depression ­ and Effexor is known to escalate the “manic” phase experienced by people with bipolarism, which is characterized by extreme feelings of elation, euphoria, racing thoughts, inability to sleep and difficulty appreciating consequences, court heard.

Although she had previously been a very light drinker, Francoeur started using alcohol excessively, Piche told court. She spent money in careless ways, went days without sleep and ate irregularly, losing significant amounts of weight. She talked excessively and took uncharacteristic shortcuts in caring for her daughters, who were five and seven years old.

The changes concerned her family members, who sent a letter to Francoeur’s doctor about the situation.

The boy had been in Francoeur’s class the previous school year, but no longer attended the school where she taught. They had exchanged text messages once that summer and one night in October he sent her a flirtatious text that resulted in their first sexual encounter, Piche said.

Several more incidents followed, until the boy’s mother discovered the situation.

Defence lawyer Aaron Fox noted Franceour would likely not have been charged with a crime had the incidents happened six months earlier, before changes to the Criminal Code raised the legal age of consent for sexual activity from 14 to 16.

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Administration

Dropping “cold turkey” off any medication, most especially mind altering medications, can often be MORE DANGEROUS than staying on the drugs. With antidepressants the FDA has now warned that any abrupt change in dose, whether increasing or decreasing the dose, can produce suicide, hostility, or psychosis – generally a manic psychosis when you then get your diagnosis for Bipolar Disorder. Of course drug-induced Bipolar is temporary so you need to learn more about that if it has already happened to you. We have a DVD on explaining this and how to recover from it: “Bipolar? Are You Really Bipolar or Misdiagnosed Due to the Use of or Abrupt Discontinuation of an Antidepressant”: https://store.drugawareness.org/product/bipolar-disorder-streaming/

The most dangerous and yet the most common mistake someone coming off any antidepressant, atypical antipsychotic, or benzodiazaphine makes is coming off these drugs too rapidly. Tapering off VERY, VERY, VERY SLOWLY–OVER MONTHS OR YEARS (The general rule of thumb for those on antidepressants (ANY antidepressant, not just the current antidepressant – add up all time on any of them) for less than a year is to take half the amount of time on them to wean off and for long-term users for each 5 years on psychiatric drugs of any kind the general rule of thumb is at least a year or more.), NOT JUST WEEKS OR MONTHS!—has proven the safest and most effective method of withdrawal from these types of medications. Thus the body is given the time it needs to readjust its own chemical levels. Patients must be warned to come very slowly off these drugs by shaving minuscule amounts off their pills each day, as opposed to cutting them.

WARNING: The practice of taking a pill every other day throws you into withdrawal every other day and can be very dangerous when you consider the FDA warnings on abrupt changes in dose.

This cannot be stressed strongly enough! This information on EXTREMELY gradual withdrawal is the most critical piece of information that someone facing withdrawal from these drugs needs to have.

A REMINDER: IT IS EASIER TO GET DOWN OFF A MOUNTAINTOP ONE GUARDED STEP AT A TIME THAN TO JUMP FROM THE TOP TO THE BOTTOM.

No matter how few or how many side effects you have had on these antidepressants, withdrawal is a whole new world. The worst part of rapid withdrawal can be delayed for several months AFTER you quit. So even if you think you are doing okay you quickly find that it becomes much worse. If you do not come off correctly and rebuild your body as you do, you risk:

Creating bouts of overwhelming depression
Producing a MUCH longer withdrawal and recovery period than if you had come off slowly
Overwhelming fatigue causing you to be unable to continue daily tasks or costing your job
Having a psychotic break brought on by the terrible insomnia from the rapid withdrawal, and then being locked in a psychiatric ward and being told you are either schizophrenic or most likely that you are Bipolar.
Ending up going back on the drugs (each period on the drugs tends to be more dangerous and problematic than the previous time you were on the drugs) and having more drugs added to calm the withdrawal effects
Seizures and other life threatening physical reactions
Violent outbursts or rages
REM Sleep Behavior Disorder which has always been known as a drug withdrawal state and is known to include both suicide and homicide – both committed in a sleep state.
Although my book, Prozac: Panacea or Pandora? Our Serotonin Nightmare!, contains massive amounts of information you can find nowhere else on these drugs, it does not have the extensive amount of information contained in the CD focusing mainly on withdrawal issues. The CD contains newer and updated information on safe withdrawal from these drugs. It details over an hour and a half the safest ways found over the past 30 years to withdraw from antidepressants and the drugs so often prescribed with them – the atypical antipsychotics and benzodiazapenes. And it explains why it is safest to withdraw tiny amounts from all of the medications at the same time rather than withdrawing only one at a time.

It also lists many safe alternative treatments that can assist you in getting though the withdrawal and lists other alternatives to avoid which are not safe after using antidepressants. And it contains information on how to rebuild your health after you have had it destroyed by these drugs so that you never end up feeling a need to be on these drugs again.

The CD is very inexpensive and will save you thousands in medical bills which far too many end up spending trying to do it on your own without this information. (One woman who decided she was okay coming down twice as fast as recommended paid a terrible price. After withdrawing she suffered the REM Sleep Disorder early one morning and attacked her husband with a baseball bat (for which she has no memory) and which ended their lifelong courtship and marriage. And cost her $30,000 to be in a psychiatric facility where they put her on five more drugs plus the antidepressant she had just withdrawn from! You can see why many have lamented that they wished they would have had the information on this CD before attempting withdrawal.

To order Ann Blake-Tracy’s book go to: https://store.drugawareness.org/product/prozac-panacea-or-pandora-our-serotonin-nightmare-2014-ebook-download/

To order the CD, “Help! I Can’t Get Off My Antidepressant!” go to: http://store.drugawareness.org/product/help-i-cant-get-off-my-antidepressant-mp3-download/

This is a CD doctors can also benefit from when attempting to withdraw their patients from these drugs which the World Health Organization has now told us are addictive and produce withdrawal. And doctors have begun to recommend the CD to their patients.

The Aftermath of Antidepressants

In 2005 the FDA issued strong warnings about changes in dose for antidepressants. They warned that ANY abrupt change in dose of an antidepressant, whether increasing or decreasing the dose….so that would include switching antidepressants, starting or stopping antidepressants, forgetting to take a pill, skipping doses, taking a pill one day & not the next, etc…. can cause suicide, hostility, and/or psychosis – generally a manic psychosis which is why so many are given a diagnosis for Bipolar Disorder after this withdrawal reaction that can so severely impair sleep leading to a psychotic break.

Clearly coming down too rapidly can be very, very dangerous. We encourage you to arm yourself with knowledge by downloading our CD on safe withdrawal.

http://www.drugawareness.org/wp-content/uploads/wpsc/product_images/thumbnails/helpicant.jpgclick here. order a CD download.
WARNING: In sharing this information about adverse reactions to antidepressants I always recommend that you also give reference to my CD on safe withdrawal, Help! I Can’t Get Off My Antidepressant!, so that we do not have more people dropping off these drugs too quickly – a move which I have warned from the beginning can be even more dangerous than staying on the drugs!

The FDA also now warns that any abrupt change in dose of an antidepressant can produce suicide, hostility or psychosis. And these reactions can either come on very rapidly or even be delayed for months depending upon the adverse effects upon sleep patterns when the withdrawal is rapid! You can find the CD on safe and effective withdrawal helps here: http://store.drugawareness.org/